By Norman E. Anderson
Let us start with a summary: The following provides an analysis of the divorce sayings of Jesus from several angles. The sayings are presented as they appear in both canonical and extra-canonical sources. Separable segments and phrases are identified and labeled. The segments are assessed in relation to the Pauline tradition, particularly 1 Corinthians 7, which is interpreted as, in part, a rabbinic commentary upon Leviticus 21 that takes into account both one form, at least, of the divorce sayings of Jesus and the decision of the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15). Absent permutations of the sayings are identified and commented upon, which leads to a short excursus upon monogamy versus polygyny in the sayings. Segments and phrases of the sayings are arrayed chronologically in relation to the Four-Source Theory of the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke). The topical correspondence and dissimilarity of segments to one another is considered, with particular attention being given to whether Synoptic analysis can shed light on the meaning of the segment that reads, "everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery" (Luke 16:18; cf. Matthew 19:9; Mark 10:11). Finally, findings are summarized and an index to phrases, segments, and logia is provided, which takes advantage of hypertext. ("Logia" is a synonym for "sayings." The singular is "logion.")
The point is to elucidate structure and to enable ready identification of shifts of meaning, all in the context of a larger reconstruction of the early Christian theology or theologies of marriage and sexuality, which is being written.
The point is not to determine the meaning of each saying. However, part of the method is to explore one or more options of meaning that might work relative to the other divorce sayings and to the Pauline tradition, this without imposing, on the basis of later presuppositions, either harmonization or conflict. Typically this entails starting with the least permissive or most contrasting interpretations; however, that is not to suggest that the less permissive or more contrasting interpretations are necessarily the correct interpretations.
In essence, this small book consists of scholar's notes, spade work, the sort of thing that tends to wind up in bottom drawers because it is at once too open-ended, too dry, too frank, and too controversial. It is also the sort of personal tool that empowers a scholar to exercise a considerable advantage in discussions with those who have no such tool ready at hand. The Internet provides a handy place for this tool to be deposited, which means that you, dear reader, now have access to whatever empowerment this tool can provide.
I should specify some of the things that are not included in this analysis:
A word on intended audience: This book is dense. It is written in a scholarly genre, initially for myself. However, it assumes little more on the part of the reader than a basic knowledge of the Bible. In other words, brief explanations of scholarly lingo are given along the way; and it is hoped that not only the highly educated scholar, but even the tenacious college freshman could both follow the lines of thought and reconstruct much of the analysis on his or her own.
In this vein, allow me to explain now that references preceded by an "M," as in MGittin, are from the Mishnah; those preceded by a "b," as in bGittin, are from the Babylonian Talmud = Talmud Bavli; and those followed by "Rabbah," as in Numbers Rabbah, are from the Midrash Rabbah.
Translations and paraphrases of the New Testament in this article are mine. I am leaving one word, porneia, untranslated and henceforth will leave it unitalicized. I take it generally to mean, in early Christian usage, impurity with regard to sexual and marital connections, having specific reference to most or all of the connections listed in Leviticus 18. Under the umbrella of a type of connection, it may entail an act of sex, a series of acts, or a state, such as the state of being in an incestuous marriage. For more on this, see below in the discussion of the possible Pauline exceptions, Exception 1.
Even though this analysis does not entail word study and even though words related to divorce and remarriage are not significant for this analysis, it is nonetheless useful to have surveyed such words prior to engaging a Synoptic analysis, for the sake of alertness, if nothing else.
Allow me, then, to list some of the relevant terms. In the first chart below may be found Hebrew words related to divorce, along with their equivalents in the ancient translation of the Bible into Greek called the Septuagint (LXX), which is sometimes quoted in the New Testament. In the second chart below may be found Greek words related to divorce and remarriage from the New Testament. Each group is in order according to its own alphabet. The sample references given are generally, if not divorce related, at least family related.
Before proceeding, at least two warnings are in order:
Greek Terms Related to Divorce and RemarriageFrom the New TestamentCopyright ©1998 by Norman E. Anderson | ||
|---|---|---|
|
Greek Term |
Basic Meaning |
Sample References |
|
Apoluo |
"to release" or "to send away" |
Matthew 1:19; 5:31-32; 19:3, 7-9; Mark 10:2, 4, 11-12; Luke 16:18 |
|
Apostasion |
"certificate of divorce" |
Matthew 5:31 |
|
Aphiemi |
"to send away" |
1 Corinthians 7:11-13 |
|
Biblion apostasiou |
"certificate of divorce" |
Matthew 19:7; Mark 10:4 |
|
Deo |
"to bind" |
Romans 7:2; 1 Corinthians 7:27 |
|
Douloo |
"to enslave" |
1 Corinthians 7:15 |
|
Eleutheros |
"free" or "independent" |
Romans 7:3; 1 Corinthians 7:21, 22, 39 |
|
Exerchomai |
"to go away" |
Mark 10:12 (some manuscripts) |
|
Katargeo |
"to be released" (passive sense) |
Romans 7:2, 6 |
|
Katecho |
"to be bound" (passive sense) |
Romans 7:6 |
|
Luo |
"to release" |
1 Corinthians 7:27 |
|
Hupandros (Begins with the letter upsilon) |
"subject to a husband" |
Romans 7:2 |
|
Chorizo (Begins with the letter chi; second and last letters are omegas) |
"to separate" |
Matthew 19:6; Mark 10:9; 1 Corinthians 7:10-11, 15 |
In this and the following two sections, the divorce logia are given with each separable segment and phrase identified and labeled. Separability is determined, first, on the basis of whether a unit is syntactically self-contained in at least some of its appearances and, second, on a historical basis. With regard to the historical basis, this question is asked: Was the segment or phrase either uniquely represented in a logion or separated in such a way as to be found in a differently configured logion?
A segment, which represents a self-contained unit within a logion, may be represented by a letter or a series of letters. To take Matthew 5:32 as an example, phrases a, b, and c represent the first segment and so would be collectively represented as segment abc. The second segment is represented by the single letter, d. The saying as a whole would be represented as logion abc/d or abcd, for short.
Phrases and segments that may differ in wording but which clearly convey the same sense receive the same letter designation. Thus phrase a appears in all of the Gospel sayings, although the wording may vary slightly. This leads to a couple of special situations:
Segments or phrases that are significantly different in wording but that have some sort of marked closeness may be represented this way: h = g.
In this section the segments and phrases are labeled in canonical rather than a supposed chronological order. This is for three reasons:
When listing segments seriatim, it is generally most convenient to do so in canonical order.
Finally, it should be noted that a discussion of segment ae may also be applicable to both abe and aef, since phrases a and e are contained in the latter segments.
Key to an analysis of the divorce sayings is to develop a language for discussing them. This labeling is a first step in that direction. Now here are the Gospel sayings, so labeled.
******
|
a |
Everyone who divorces his wife, |
|
b |
except on the ground of porneia, |
|
c |
causes her to commit adultery; |
|
d |
and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. |
|
a |
Whoever divorces his wife, |
|
b |
except for porneia, |
|
e |
and marries another commits adultery. |
|
a |
Whoever divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries another commits adultery |
|
f |
against her; |
|
g |
and if she divorces her husband, should she marry another, she commits adultery.* |
|
a |
Everyone who divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries another commits adultery; |
|
d |
and he who marries a woman divorced by her husband commits adultery. |
* Regarding divorce of one's husband in the Near East, compare the Laws of Hammurabi xxx 60-xxxi 12 = 142-143; the Hittite Laws 26a; Judges 19:2; Proverbs 2:17; 1 Corinthians 7:10-11, 13; Philo, De specialibus legibus 3:82; Pseudo-Philo 42:1; and Genesis Rabbah 18:5; among other references. There is also the Jewish rite of chalitsah in which a woman, in essence, divorces herself from her deceased husband's brother (Deuteronomy 25:7-10). By the way, it should be noted that Roman custom allowed for divorce by either the wife or her paterfamilias.
|
a |
But if after divorcing his wife |
|
e |
he should marry another, then he too commits adultery. |
|
d |
Whosoever marries her who has been divorced from another husband, commits adultery ... |
|
aegsum |
All who, according to human law, contract a second marriage are sinners in the eyes of our Master. (Justin seems to be providing an interpretive summary of aeg, which corresponds most closely to Mark 10:11-12.) |
|
h |
A wife must not separate from her husband. |
|
i |
But if she does separate, let her remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. (Cf. Hermas. Mandates 4.1.6, 8, and especially 10.) |
|
j |
And a husband must not divorce his wife. |
|
k |
Are you bound to a woman? Do not seek to be released. |
|
l |
Are you released from a woman? Do not seek a woman. |
|
m |
Yet even if you marry, you will not have sinned; |
|
n |
and if a maiden marries, she does not sin. |
|
j |
He who has married should not repudiate his wife, |
|
o |
and he who has not married should not marry. (Compare 1 Corinthians 7:27, maybe also verse 8. What Clement represents as a saying of the Lord may be an adaptation of Paul. In 7:25, Paul specifically says he has "no command of the Lord" to this effect.) |
One of the many mysteries regarding the divorce sayings of Jesus has to do with the logion behind 1 Corinthians 7:10-11. With each phrase labeled, the task of reconstructing that logion is rendered easier; although any reconstruction is hardly rendered conclusive.
Taking as our set the phrases and segments in the divorce sayings of the Gospels, Paul's phrase h, "a wife must not separate from her husband," corresponds most closely to segment g, the only Gospel segment that speaks of a wife divorcing her husband; and his phrase j, "a husband must not divorce his wife," corresponds most closely to abc. The latter is so, since abc, like j, is simply about a man initiating divorce and not about also marrying another. Thus a reconstruction of the logion Paul was drawing upon might look like this:
|
The Reconstructed Logion Side by Side with 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Segments |
Reconstructed Logion |
1 Corinthians 7:10-11 | ||
|
If a woman divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery. (Cf. 7:39) |
A wife must not separate from her husband. | ||
|
If a man divorces his wife, except on the ground of porneia, he causes her to commit adultery. |
And a husband must not divorce his wife. | ||
Why include b, "except on the ground of porneia," in this reconstruction? There are several reasons:
|
The Porneia Exception of Matthew 5:32 Compared with 1 Corinthians 7:2 | ||
|---|---|---|
|
References |
Greek Text |
Meaning |
|
Matthew 5:32 |
pas ho ... parektos logou porneias |
"all who ... except on the ground of porneia" |
|
1 Corinthians 7:2 |
dia de tas porneias hekastos |
"but because of porneia, each man" |
Why add yet another form of the saying rather than simply assuming that Paul was eclectically drawing upon two sayings, those corresponding to Matthew 5:32 (for segment abc) and Mark 10:11-12 (for segment g)? There are three reasons:
Of course, none of these reasons is compelling. They are simply ways of thinking about the issue.
To my mind, the most serious challenge to this reconstruction has to do with a slightly less obvious point. Segment h is simply about a woman initiating divorce and not about also marrying another, which means that it does not correspond perfectly to segment g. Among the possible explanations are these:
The question then arises, if Paul could extract a simple statement from the complex construction of segment g, then why not from the complex construction of segment ae? This would be a distinct possibility. The resulting reconstruction would then look something like this:
|
The Logion behind 1 Corinthians 7:10-11: An Alternative | |
|---|---|
|
g |
If a woman divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery. |
|
a |
Everyone who divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries another commits adultery. |
For all intents and purposes, this logion is identical to the logion of Mark 10:11-12. This means that it would be superfluous to postulate another logion. However, it also means giving up the simplest and most direct correspondence, namely the correspondence between segments abc and j. The law of parsimony (Occam's razor) says that the simplest explanation that takes account of all the facts is best. In this case, we seem to have a balance. Is there any evidence to tip it? Perhaps.
If we do indeed have an echo of the porneia exception and specifically of phrase bMt5:32 in 1 Corinthians 7:2, this would suggest that Paul was aware of segment abc. So it seems reasonable to suppose that Paul was either aware of the unknown logion gabc or of both segment abc and logion gae. Until we have evidence that Paul was aware of multiple logia, it is at least compact to suppose that he was aware of a combination that looked like gabc, even if he was responsible for that combination himself.
Paul does not mention a logion behind 1 Corinthians 7:27-28 (segments k/l/m), but the question arises as to whether 7:27-28 may have a relationship to the reconstructed logion behind 7:10-11. Let's consider this question in relation to both of the possible logia behind 7:10-11, namely gae and gabc.
First, logion gae. A striking parallel seems to emerge when segments k and l are placed side by side with segment ae, provided segment ae is split. (For the split structure, see below under the "Topical Analysis," where it is called Structure B.)
|
1 Corinthians 7:27-28 in Relation to Segment ae | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Segments |
Segment of Reconstructed Logion |
1 Corinthians 7:27-28 | ||
|
Everyone who divorces his wife (commits adultery) |
Are you bound to a woman? Do not seek to be released. | ||
|
and (everyone who) marries "another" commits adultery. |
Are you released from a woman? Do not seek a woman. (Yet even if you marry, you will not have sinned.) | ||
This correlation, however, has two basic problems.
I find these failures of correlation telling and so regard it as improbable that segments k/l/m (1 Corinthians 7:27-28) have a directly parallel relationship to segment ae.
However, it is yet possible that logion gae has a different sort of correlation to 1 Corinthians 7:27-28, perhaps along these lines, reversing the order of g/ae to conform to 7:27-28:
|
1 Corinthians 7:10-11 and 7:27-28 in Relation to Logion aeg | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Segments |
Reconstructed Logion |
1 Corinthians 7:10-11 |
1 Corinthians 7:27-28 | |||
|
Everyone who divorces his wife and marries "another" commits adultery. |
A husband must not divorce his wife. |
Are you bound to a woman? Do not seek to be released. | |||
|
If a woman divorces her husband and marries "another," she commits adultery. |
A wife must not separate from her husband. |
Are you released from a woman? Do not seek a woman. (Yet even if you marry, you will not have sinned.) | |||
At first glance, it looks like segments g and l have no correlation. However, as has already been observed, phrase l refers to a divorce action initiated by the woman. The only Gospel segment that shares that feature in common is segment g. This means that phrase l may actually be an elaboration of phrase g. So logion gae or, in this case, aeg could have had a direct bearing upon 1 Corinthians 7:27-28.
Next, logion gabc. Segment k ("Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be released") is easy to correlate to phrase abc, which says that "if a man divorces his wife, except on the ground of porneia, he causes her to commit adultery" (Matthew 5:32). And we have just finished correlating segment l to segment g. Here would be the result, once again reversing the order of the Gospel segments, this time to give abcg as the reconstructed logion:
|
1 Corinthians 7:10-11 and 7:27-28 in Relation to Logion abcg | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Segments |
Reconstructed Logion |
1 Corinthians 7:10-11 |
1 Corinthians 7:27-28 | |||
|
If a man divorces his wife, except on the ground of porneia, he causes her to commit adultery. |
A husband must not divorce his wife. |
Are you bound to a woman? Do not seek to be released. | |||
|
If a woman divorces her husband and marries "another," she commits adultery. |
A wife must not separate from her husband. |
Are you released from a woman? Do not seek a woman. (Yet even if you marry, you will not have sinned.) | |||
Given the two viable sets of correlations, it is reasonable to assume that the logion behind 1 Corinthians 7:27-28 is exactly the same as that postulated as being behind 7:10-11, except that the order of segments might be reversed to give either aeg or abcg
In order to undertake a proper analysis of the divorce sayings of Jesus, it is necessary to reckon not just with the Apostle Paul's notice of at least one such logion, but also with Paul's treatment of divorce more generally, which is incorporated into his handling of sexual and marital issues in 1 Corinthians 5-7. This is necessary in order to determine whether Paul's treatment might be congruous with other sayings of Jesus on divorce. If Paul's treatment of divorce is anywhere incongruous and irreconcilable with one of the sayings of Jesus, this would suggest that he was unaware of that form of the saying; for it is unlikely that he would have deliberately contradicted Jesus.
This means that we must consider several of Paul's references and possible references to divorce, especially his comments on the case of divorce from an unbelieving spouse. Those comments include the so-called Pauline privilege or privilegium Paulinum (1 Corinthians 7:15), which appears to allow for divorce and remarriage under certain conditions.
It should be emphasized that the point here is not to give a full and satisfactory interpretation of 1 Corinthians 7, but only to determine whether Paul's views on divorce might encompass a reasonable interpretation of the divorce sayings or whether they must stand in conflict with some of those sayings.
Here is a translation of the passage regarding divorce from an unbelieving spouse.
|
1 Corinthians 7:12-15 | |
|---|---|
|
7:12 |
But to the rest I say, not the Lord, if any brother has an unbelieving wife and she consents to live with him, let him not divorce her; |
|
7:13 |
and if any woman has an unbelieving husband and this one consents to live with her, let her not divorce the husband. |
|
7:14 |
For the unbelieving husband is made holy in the wife; and the unbelieving wife is made holy in the brother; otherwise your children are unclean, but now they are holy. |
|
7:15 |
Yet if the unbelieving spouse separates, let it be so; in such a case the brother or sister is not bound. It is to peace that God has called you. |
Does this passage exclude Paul's awareness or acceptance of any of the divorce sayings of Jesus? In order to answer this question, it is necessary, first, to identify the issues. We are dealing with not just one, but five possible exceptions to the divorce sayings of Jesus:
Yet three more exceptions may be found in other sections of Paul's treatment of sexuality and marriage in 1 Corinthians 5-7.
Please recall that two previous exceptions have already been dispatched, which we can call exceptions 9 and 10. Yet another exception has to do with whether Paul conflicted with Jesus on the matter of the indissolubility of marriage, for Paul recognized divorces initiated by unbelievers. Such an exception would depend, first, upon whether or not Jesus necessarily taught the indissolubility of marriage; and that issue is touched upon in passing. Second, if Jesus did teach the indissolubility of marriage, such an exception would depend upon whether or not Paul allowed divorced women to remarry. However, as we shall see, it appears that Jesus did not necessarily teach indissolubility. Now to deal with the eight possible exceptions and to offer a conclusion as to which ones may be dispatched.
******
The first exception, regarding Paul's instruction to the believer to remain married to an unbeliever despite Jesus' allowance of divorce on the grounds of porneia, is probably the trickiest exception to sort out.
The Council of Jerusalem had distilled four "cut off" offenses in the Holiness Code of Leviticus that applied to aliens living with the Israelites and so that were applied to Gentiles being grafted into the early church (Acts 15:20, 29). One of those offenses was porneia, which, if this interpretation is correct, included the whole cluster of sexual and marital offenses mentioned in Leviticus 18, or at least most of them. (So far this paragraph is drawing upon a seminal article by J.W. Hunkin in the Journal of Theological Studies; v. 27, no. 107, April 1926.) In other words, the definition of porneia used by the early church, at least in some instances, was not vague; it was not based upon general usage in the Greco-Roman world. Instead, it had specific reference to the Torah and, even more specifically, to Leviticus 18, hence Paul's resounding condemnation of a man taking his father's wife in 1 Corinthians 5.
However, priests were subject to additional rules regarding marriage and sexuality, rules which are outlined in Leviticus 21 (cf. Ezekiel 44:22 and Josephus, Antiquities 3:276-277 = 3:2). Every priest was disallowed taking either a harlot or a divorced woman (21:7). The wife of a High Priest was to be a virgin of his own people (Leviticus 21:14). Other levitical priests were allowed to marry widows (21:7 contrasted with 21:14); and they were otherwise allowed a wider latitude than the High Priest as to choice of wife, although they fell under the restrictions for all Israelites as specified in the Torah, which prohibited intermarriage with the nations of Palestine (Exodus 34:11, 16; Deuteronomy 7:1, 3-4), a prohibition which was later generalized (Malachi 2:11) and in early Christianity spiritualized.
I take 1 Corinthians 5-7 to be a rabbinic responsum to (that is, a legal judgment for) the Corinthian church and, in that context, 6:15-7:40 to be, in part, a midrash (that is, a rabbinic commentary) upon Leviticus 21. Paul is presenting rules for temple holiness, the temple being the body of Christ. This meant that Christ had to be treated with the holiness of the High Priest; and any woman sexually joined to his body, that is, to a priestly male under the headship of Christ, was expected to satisfy in spiritual terms the conditions for priests' wives, preferably even for a wife of the High Priest. (Take note of the priesthood of believers in 1 Peter 2:4-10 and Revelation 1:6; 5:10; 20:6.)
Thus the instructions for a man who was a believer were these:
In other words, Paul systematically addressed every category of womanhood as applicable to the rules of holiness for priests.
The question for us is this: Was intermarriage between believers and unbelievers to be classed as porneia? This may have been a question even on the part of the Corinthian church, for at least two reasons:
With regard to intermarriage between believers and unbelievers, Paul carefully frames his wording so that the answer to the question raised above must be no, it is not a form of porneia. Otherwise Paul could not instruct that believers already married to unbelievers should remain in those marriages, which would be to remain in a state of porneia; nor could he say that the unbelieving spouse and the children were made holy. Presumably Paul's reasoning would have been that the priestly restrictions with regard to intermarriage are not rooted in the "cut off" offenses of Leviticus 18 and so should not be classed as porneia.
If Paul's instruction that a believer should not initiate divorce against an unbeliever was an exception, it was an exception to a principle of holiness rather than to a saying of Jesus. In other words, Paul is not adding an exception to the porneia exception.
******
Now to move on to the second and third possible exceptions, which can be handled together. To repeat the issues:
Between the active and the passive, the problems with segments ae and g resolve themselves. The issue is simply one of who initiates the divorce. Paul is not making an exception to either segment. He is instead carrying out the implication regarding the other side of the coin, if he is conscious of those segments at all (and he seems to be of segment g). In other words, although the believing spouse is not free to initiate a divorce against the unbelieving spouse, if the unbelieving spouse initiates the divorce, the believer is free to remarry.
******
The fourth and fifth possible exceptions can also be handled together. Again to repeat:
Segments abc and d constitute the most direct challenge to Paul. However, it is quite possible that he interpreted them in a limited sense. Observe that whereas logion abe (Matthew 19:9) and logion aefg (Mark 10:11-12) are introduced by way of reference to the creation accounts (specifically Genesis 1:27 = 5:2; and 2:24), which were understood to be applicable to all of humankind, logion abcd (Matthew 5:32) is introduced by way of reference only to Israelite Law, specifically to Deuteronomy 24:1-4. (The other occurrence of segment d, in Luke 16:18, lacks any such introduction.) The absence of a universal referent for abc and d would have allowed Paul to restrict the applicability of abc and d to those within the covenant of faith, which in turn would have given weight to the idea of a "neighbor's wife" in Leviticus 18:20 (cf. 20:10). In other words, Paul could have interpreted abc and d this way:
|
A Possible Pauline Interpretation of Logion abc/d | |
|---|---|
|
abc |
If a man within the covenant of faith divorces his wife, except for porneia, he causes her to commit adultery. |
|
d |
Whoever marries a woman divorced from a man within the covenant of faith commits adultery. |
Curiously, Paul complained that he himself had been misunderstood by the confusion of all people with people in the faith (1 Corinthians 5:9-13).
This may be the juncture to comment that much more is going on in 1 Corinthians 6-7 than an application of Leviticus 21 as filtered through one or more of the divorce sayings of Jesus and the decision of the Council of Jerusalem. Among other things, Paul appears to be explicating the effect of conversion.
Conversion means a fresh start for each convert, at least in terms of his or her previous sinful status (1 Corinthians 6:11, 20). Thus a harlot is no longer a harlot but can be classed with any other woman that has never been married and yet is no longer a maiden (7:8). It may also mean a fresh start in terms of separation from the old life, even if that separation takes place well after conversion, as in the case of a woman believer being divorced by her unbelieving husband (7:15). Her status is not one of being a divorced woman. Rather it is one of being free of constraints that might have carried over from the old life and of being eligible for a fresh marriage in the context of the new life.
Thematically the closest parallel in the Hebrew Bible to Paul's line of thought regarding conversion is the story of Ruth. Indeed, Paul may have had Ruth in the forefront of his mind as he wrote 1 Corinthians 7:15. This verse is about being left by an unbelieving spouse; Ruth 1:8-14, is about being left by an unbelieving daughter-in-law. With the one who remains, there is a fundamental difference in status. The Hebrew Bible reflects great unease about intermarriage of Israelites with Moabites (Numbers 25:1-5; Deuteronomy 23:3-6; 1 Kings 11:1-11; Ezra 9-10; Nehemiah 13:23-29; contrast Ruth 1:4 and 1 Chronicles 4:22; 8:8-9). But Ruth declared to Naomi, her mother-in-law, that "Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God" (Ruth 1:16). By this act of faith, she in essence ceased to be a Moabite and became an Israelite, in fact ultimately the great grandmother of King David.
Much more can be said about this aspect of 1 Corinthians 6-7, that is, about the new life versus the old life. I will simply refer the reader to an article by David Daube, entitled "Pauline Contributions to a Pluralistic Culture: Re-Creation and Beyond," in Jesus and Man's Hope, editors, Donald G. Miller, Dikran Y. Hadidian ([Pittsburgh]: Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, c1971; A Perspective Book; 2): pages 223-245. I should mention, however, that my interpretation differs from Daube's in several significant respects, for instance:
******
Assuming that the man who had his father's wife in 1 Corinthians 5 was married to her and that Paul intended that union to end, this would seem to be an exception to the porneia exception (phrase b), which merely allowed divorce in the case of porneia.
To start with, it is not clear that the man had married his father's wife. Nor is it clear either that Paul intended that union to end or that the union did in fact end. It is only clear that Paul wished the union had never taken place; and it is supposed that the man sorrowed over his offense and was forgiven (2 Corinthians 2:1-11). It is possible that the union persisted, especially if the father was deceased and cohabitation had already taken place. (For discussion of a similar case in yYebamoth 12a, see Daube, just cited above, p. 237.)
There is another dimension to consider, the porneia exception itself. Conceivably Paul did not understand the porneia exception as just an allowance. He may have understood it as a shorthand way of referring to the assortment of remedies for porneia. For some porneia offenses, divorce may have been more of an imperative than for others.
The point is that we know so little not only about the situation to which Paul was speaking but also about how he himself might have interpreted the porneia exception, that we can scarcely postulate an exception to the porneia exception here.
******
If the harlot being referred to in 1 Corinthians 6:14-18 happened to be the wife of a believer, Paul's counsel would seem to require divorce, which would be another exception to the porneia exception as a mere allowance. In other words, with Jesus divorce was only allowed, not commanded in the case of a wife who had been taken sexually by another man; whereas Paul would seem to be commanding it.
Jesus' attitude was consistent with certain examples found in the Hebrew Bible (see, for instance, Judges 14:20; 15:1-8; 19:3; 1 Samuel 25:44; 2 Samuel 3:12-16; Jeremiah 3:12-13; Hosea 2:7; 4:10-15, 18); whereas Paul might have been following another line of thought. A few possibilities come to mind:
A number of comments can be made to show that this argument for a necessary conflict between Jesus and Paul is flawed.
So once again we have found that a supposed exception, in this case an exception to the porneia exception (phrase b), is not a necessary exception at all.
******
1 Corinthians 7:27-28 says:
|
k |
Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be released. |
|
l |
Are you released from a wife? Do not seek a wife. |
|
m |
Yet even if (ean de kai) you marry, you will not have sinned. |
Segment m seems to be a response not just to segment l, but also to segment k, thus implying that a man might seek to be released from his wife in order to be married to another. This would appear to be, if not a full-fledged exception to, at least a significant qualification of segment abc, which generally disallows a man from divorcing his wife. In other words, the husband may not take a divorce action, but he might ask his wife to do so; or they might come to a mutual agreement about divorce, which, in fact, seems to have been a common occurrence in the ancient world. (See, for example, the deed of divorce for Zois and Antipater, 13 B.C.E., in Select Papyri, v. 1 (1932), item 6, in the Loeb Classical Library.)
To say that Paul was referring to situations where the woman would agree to remain celibate or perhaps to situations where the woman would be classed as an unbeliever does not alleviate the tension. The qualification of Jesus remains.
There are at least three possible responses to this possible exception.
First, it is quite possible that segment m refers only to segment l. This interpretation certainly makes a more comfortable fit with the phrase, ean de kai, which means "but even though" or "but also if."
Second, all of the divorce sayings of Jesus can be interpreted as applying to unilateral repudiations as distinguished from divorce by mutual consent; and it is possible that Paul interpreted them so. The chief obstacle to this understanding of Paul is 1 Corinthians 7:39, which says that "a wife is bound as long as her husband lives." However, Paul might simply have been saying that a wife did not have the authority to dissolve marital bonds on her own in such a way as to allow for remarriage and to be free of the accusation of adultery. If her husband divorced her or if there was divorce by mutual consent, then the two were no longer husband and wife; and 1 Corinthians 7:39 would be irrelevant.
Third, even if segment m refers to both of the preceding segments, we must beware of imposing a monogamous presumption. Paul could be saying this:
|
k |
If you have one, two, three, or more wives, don't try to be rid of any of them. |
|
m |
But also if you marry again, it is not a sin. |
The use of the singular, "a wife," in segment k does not pose a particular problem to this interpretation. In the Hebrew Bible, the word "wife" as singular had often been used to mean either singular or plural, especially if abstract. See, for instance, Exodus 20:17 and Deuteronomy 5:21, which both refer to servant(s) and animal(s) as well as wife (wives); Leviticus 18:8 = 20:11, which refers to a father's wife besides the man's mother; and 18:9 = 20:17, and 18:11, which refer to a man's sister, even specifying different kinds of possible relationships. For other examples, see Leviticus 18:14 = 20:20; 18:15 = 20:12; 18:16 = 20:21; 18:20 = 20:10.
Given this paraphrase, presumably the line of thought would be something like this: To be married is no sin. Restraint from taking a divorce action against one's wife is no sin (although the converse would be wrong). And taking an additional wife is no sin.
The first response defuses the supposed exception of all force, since the problem does not arise. The second response defuses the supposed exception of all force, since a distinction is being made between unilateralism and mutuality. The third response defuses the supposed exception of all force, since there is no reason for a man to be released in order to marry. Thus, even if segment m refers to both segments, k and l, we have no compelling reason to suppose an exception to or even a qualification of the divorce sayings of Jesus here.
******
This interpretive analysis must lead us to the conclusion that none of the extant or reconstructed divorce sayings of Jesus is incompatible with the Pauline teaching on divorce. In fact, it appears that Paul might well have been aware of the introductory context of segment abcd (see above); and, if that is so, we might even tease out the inference that he was aware of its difference from the introductory context of segments abe (Matthew 19:9) and/or aefg (Mark 10:11-12).
I hesitate to go a step further and infer from this that Paul might have been aware of both abcd and aefg. That would mean that he might well have combined g and abc himself. Such an inference is highly tenuous, since it is built upon a series of other inferences.
In any case, it is entirely possible not only that Paul's teaching on divorce is compatible with the divorce sayings of Jesus, but that Paul was well aware of all segments of the divorce sayings now found in the canonical Gospels. This would account for Paul's extraordinary consonance with all of the divorce sayings of Jesus now represented in the Gospels.
Are there other permutations of the divorce sayings, besides those that appear in the canonical Gospels, that can be deduced; and is there anything that can be learned from them? The two most obvious possibilities are these:
Each combination will be discussed in turn. The discussion of segments d and g will be followed by a comment upon the polygynous double standard implicit in that combination.
******
|
abc |
If a man divorces his wife, except for porneia, he causes her to commit adultery. |
|
abe |
If a man divorces his wife, except for porneia, and marries another, he commits adultery. |
Apart from the vagaries of history, three possibilities come to mind as to why an abc/abe combination does not occur.
By the way, it is remotely possible that segments abc and ae appeared together in the hypothetical source document called Q. See below under "Chronological analysis."
******
|
d |
He who marries a woman divorced by her husband commits adultery. |
|
g |
If a woman divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery. |
The combination of d and g is hardly redundant. In fact, the two segments seem to complement one another well, except that segment g has a double condition. One must wonder why the two segments are not reported as having occurred together. Apart from the vagaries of history, certain possibilities come to mind.
A word on the apparent double standard: Intriguingly the dg combination corresponds to Leviticus 20:10 = 18:20 and its converse as applicable to the woman. In other words:
This provides the definition of adultery that held throughout the Hebrew Bible (for example, Deuteronomy 22:22; Job 31:9-11; and Proverbs 6:24-35). It is the definition of adultery that suits a polygynous culture: Each wife is to be kept under exclusive control; the man is to be free to seek other wives and concubines. (This double standard, in a modified form, became a substratum of later European and American societies, even though they operated with a self-understanding that they were monogamous to the exclusion of polygamy.)
One of the greatest surprises of this analysis is that this polygynous definition of adultery appears, at first glance, to be implicit in the d/g combination, and if in the combination, then in each segment separately. That it is possible for this to be more than just an accident of artificial combination becomes evident when we observe that the same double standard is operative in Paul.
|
The Man | |
|---|---|
|
1 Corinthians 7:27-28 |
Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be released. Are you released from a wife? Do not seek a wife. Yet even if you marry, you will not have sinned. |
|
| |
|
The Woman | |
|
7:10-11 |
A wife must not separate from her husband. But if she does separate, let her remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. |
|
7:39 |
A wife is bound for as long as her husband lives; but if her husband has fallen asleep, she is free to be married to whom she chooses, only in the Lord. |
Moreover, this double standard was deeply embedded in the milieu. Polygyny was still practiced in Jesus' time, and hints of it can be detected throughout the New Testament. As Josephus says, "It is an ancestral custom of ours to have several wives at the same time" (Antiquities 17:14 = 17.1.2).
In moral discourse, the double standard received perhaps its cleanest expression in a form of the Golden Rule specifically applied to adultery. See, for example, the Legend of Ahikar from a Syriac MS. in the University of Cambridge, maxim 6 (the legend dates back perhaps to the Seventh Century B.C.E., but it is not known when this particular maxim was integrated into the text):
Compare the Sentences of the Syriac Menander 246-247 (sometime before 400 C.E.):
That the polygynous double standard must be reckoned with in the New Testament is fairly clear. What is less than clear is that the d/g combination embodies it. I express this strong hesitation for four reasons.
As we proceed, we must keep our minds open to a polygynous interpretation of the divorce sayings of Jesus, while at the same time realizing that this investigation may very well take us in a different direction.
******
This finding, that the divorce sayings of Jesus might embody the polygynous double standard regarding adultery, challenges long cherished notions about the significance of those sayings. So I should probably step outside of this analysis for just a moment in order to address them.
One cherished notion is that the divorce sayings overturned polygyny in favor of monogamy. The other, closely related, is that the sayings overturned a sexist double standard with regard to the social structure of marriage. Quite apart from this analysis, such inferences have always been problematic, for several reasons:
If a polygynous double standard is implicit in the divorce sayings of Jesus, that is not to suggest that equality of any sort between the sexes is totally absent. Sexual equality may indeed be present in the divorce sayings, in several ways:
The Apostle Paul carries sexual equality at the spiritual (as opposed to the social) level even further by declaring that not only does a believing husband have sanctifying power over an unbelieving wife, but a believing wife has sanctifying power over an unbelieving husband (1 Corinthians 7:14); furthermore by saying, within what might very well be the climactic statement of his Epistle to the Galatians, that in Christ Jesus "there is neither male nor female" (3:28). However, Paul, like Jesus, was straddling two realms; and his egalitarian statements about the spiritual order presupposed the double standard, to which he attributed theological significance, in the social/legal/cultic-purity order. That is the very crux of much of the theological debate going on today; but, for the moment, I shall leave it untouched, since its treatment is well outside the scope of this book.
Finally, it must be said that an ethic regarding marital forms should be built, not upon a misinterpretation of texts that belong to a culture fundamentally open to polygyny, but upon a philosophy and theology of the human person in relationship. A theology of the person in relationship should take account of, not least, relationship to God, considering, for instance, issues of divine inheritance, of headship in relation to that inheritance, of justice towards spouses partially in relation to that inheritance, and of what contributes towards the building up of the kingdom of God. It is not that either the divorce sayings or the creation texts, which are cited in some of the same pericopes, will be irrelevant; but they must be interpreted honestly and with contextual insight; and their use in our theologizing must be with an awareness of and total openness about what we are doing.
Do the divorce sayings reflect strata in terms of full logia, segments, phrases, or wording; or can they be traced back as independently existing pieces? Which of those pieces might have originated with Jesus, and which might be better explained by later developments in the church? How do the divorce sayings fit into current theories about the development of the Gospels? What might the divorce sayings tell us about the hypothetical sources behind the Synoptic Gospels?
These may have been among the unformed questions in my mind when I originally undertook the chronological analysis that follows. However, the basic question I was consciously trying to answer was this: What would happen if I try to arrange the sayings and their parts in chronological order? Is there anything to be learned? It turns out that the answer is, yes, plenty, in fact something significant in terms of all of the other questions just posed.
In the end, I wound up doing not just one chronological analysis, but three. The first analysis is conducted on the basis of general content or meaning (as opposed to wording) in relation to current Synoptic theory. The second analysis is conducted on the basis of variation and sameness of wording, with only a passing nod being given to current Synoptic theory. The third analysis is a synthesis of the first two, which, to my enormous surprise, required little change in either but rendered some of the current theory superfluous. Each analysis is comprised of one or more charts followed by a series of observations.
The first and third analyses take account of both relative and absolute dating; the second analysis involves itself with relative dating only. Relative dating is an assessment of what comes before and after. Absolute dating is assignment of fixed dates. Before proceeding to those analyses, a short digression upon dating, relative and absolute, as related to the divorce sayings of Jesus, is in order.
******
The weight of scholarship supports the theory that the Gospels of Matthew and Luke drew in common upon at least two sources, the Gospel of Mark and a hypothetical document called Q (Quelle, which means "source" in German). The material common to both Matthew and Luke but not to Mark, with some exceptions, is supposed to have derived from Q. (Q is cited using the versification in Luke.) Material that is distinctive to Matthew is called M, and material that is distinctive to Luke is called L. So the theory can be schematized in this (vastly over-simplified) way:
Those who recognize as written sources only Q and Mark are said to hold to the Two-Source Theory. Those who hold that M and L were separate sources, whether oral or written, are said to hold to the Four-Source Theory. The variations are numerous, for example, the view that any of the hypothetical source documents may actually represent an assortment of documents or oral traditions or that they may be stratified in and of themselves.
I am one of those who harbors strong doubts about these theories. I suspect that an early recension of the Gospel of Matthew might hold the proper claim to priority among the canonical Gospels; and, in any case, I fear that the Q hypothesis is generating more serious problems than it is solving and is, after 160 years of development, in danger of collapse. However, for the purposes of this document, the theory just outlined will do, since the relative dating of the Synoptic Gospels does not appear to be critical to an analysis of the Jesus logia on divorce, except that much has been made of a late date for the porneia exception (phrase b, which appears in Matthew 5:32 and 19:9).
Speaking of the date of the porneia exception, as already discussed above, I suspect that the porneia exception is actually early, in fact pre-Pauline. The first chart below reflects that opinion within the over-arching context of the prevailing theory. The second chart offers further evidence in support of that opinion.
******
Very few of the early sources for the sayings of Jesus on divorce can be dated precisely or with certainty. Even the ranges given in the charts below, which are based upon mainstream scholarly opinion, are subject to considerable error. However, it is helpful to have a sense of the estimated lapse of time between sources and a means of correlating those sources to their historical context.
One of the key events used for absolute dating of the Synoptic Gospels is the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 C.E. Many scholars see allusions to its destruction in the Gospels and therefore date those allusions after that event. (See, for example, Matthew 24; Mark 13; and Luke 19:41-44; 21:5-36.) I tend towards the view that the destruction of the Second Temple is not necessarily detectable in the Synoptic Gospels. Jesus' apocalyptic utterances fit squarely within the prophetic tradition and were general enough to be susceptible to a wide range of application, as subsequent history proved. Furthermore, well before the destruction of the Second Temple, the early Christians already had a well developed temple theology, which was vested in the body of Christ and which allowed them a certain distance. (See, for instance, I Corinthians 6, which has already been discussed.) For those and for other reasons, I feel no compulsion towards a late absolute date for any of the canonical Gospels.
On the other hand, neither do I feel a compulsion towards an early date. I suspect an early date for all of the canonical Gospels, among other reasons because as compositions they reflect a milieu that predates the definition of Christianity over against Judaism, in fact, a milieu that is yet steeped in concepts of temple purity. However, it is conceivable that one or more of the canonical Gospels was compiled as late as the first decade of the Second Century.
******
|
Year of the Common Era (C.E. or A.D.) |
Phrase |
Source |
|---|---|---|
|
27-30 |
<abcd, abe, aed, aefg,gabc>?? |
Jesus |
|
27-57 |
g |
G source |
|
27-57 (or 27-70) |
ae |
G source?? |
|
27-57 |
abc |
C source = M? |
|
27-57 |
gabc (or possibly gae) |
Reconstructed text behind 1 Cor 7:10 |
|
50-80 |
[ae]d or [abe]d |
Q 16:18 |
|
54-57 |
hij, plus the Pauline privilege |
1 Corinthians 7:10-11, 15 |
|
64-70 |
aefg |
Mark 10:11-12 |
|
65-80 |
abcd, abe (bc = M, not Q) |
Matthew 5:32; 19:9 |
|
65-80 |
aed (d = Q 16:18) |
Luke 16:18 |
|
140-155 |
ae |
Hermas, Mandates 4.1.6 |
|
155 |
d, aegsum |
Justin Martyr, Apology 1:15 |
|
200-215 |
jo |
Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis |
1. G is a source that I am postulating. G stands for the Greek word for wife, since the key segment attributed to the G source, namely g, is an interpretation of the law for wives. Here's the rationale: Since segment g was separable from abc (see the reconstruction of the text behind 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 in relation to Matthew 5:32), a separate source may be indicated.
2. C is another source that I am postulating. C stands for the alliteration in the English phrase, "causes her to commit." It was already clear that the phrases of the C source, namely abc, were a distinct unit, separable from d on the basis of Matthew 5:32 in relation to Luke 16:18. In this analysis, it becomes evident that abc was separable from g on the basis of the reconstructed text behind 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 in relation to Matthew 5:32, that is, provided gabc is the text behind 1 Corinthians 7:10-11, which is my first choice.
3. Regarding segment ae, clearly it was separable, since it appears separately with both g and d as well as alone. If gae was the form of the text behind 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 (my second choice), then segment ae would have been earlier than 1 Corinthians. Conceivably it originated from the same source as segment g. If so, segments ae and g may have been separate; or they may have constituted a single logion, perhaps with a form very much like we see in Mark 10:11-12 (aefg).
4. Regarding Q 16:18, properly speaking only segment d belongs to Q, but in order to fill out the logion, a corresponding segment may be appropriate. Segment d is already associated with segments abc and ae, but only phrases a and e are to be found in both Matthew and Luke, making aeLk16:18 = abeMt 19:9 the better candidate. However, phrases a and e are also found in Mark, which means that if Q includes phrases a and e, a wrench is thrown into the understanding of Q as being exclusive of Mark. (Of course, most scholars acknowledge such exceptions.) If a wrench is to be thrown into the understanding of Q anyway, it should be noted that other segments are yet in the running. Q might originally have had either an abc/d or a d/g combination.
5. If Q had an abe/d combination, a wrench is thrown into the understanding of Q as the overlap between Matthew and Luke, since Luke lacks phrase b. Taking this together with the previous point, if phrases a and e are part of Q, whether in the abe or ae combination, the strict understanding of the nature of Q is violated.
6. The main possibilities regarding the porneia exception (phrase b) in the abe combination, as distinct from the abc combination, are these:
7. I observe that the compilation of Q in English translation which appears in The Complete Gospels: Annotated Scholar's Version, Robert J. Miller, editor (1992) makes segment abc a part of Q (see p. 294). However, this is based upon a forced harmonization of abcMt5:32 with aeLk16:18, so that abcMt5:32 is made to read: "Everyone who divorces his wife (except in the case of infidelity) makes her the victim of adultery." I find it odd that abcMt5:32 instead of abeMt19:9 was chosen for Q, except that abcMt5:32 and aeLk16:18 share in common both the wording of phrase a and the attachment of a form of segment d. A basic contradiction is going on. Q is determined in the first instance according to content, not wording; but here associated wording is overriding actual content. Analogous to the exegetical fallacy of confusing words and concepts, here we have the synoptic fallacy of confusing texts and content.
8. I observe that the compilation of Q in English by Burton L. Mack has this translation: "Everyone who divorces his wife commits adultery, and the one who marries a divorced woman commits adultery." See The Lost Gospel: The Book of Q & Christian Origins (c1993): p. 100 (his QS 56). The translation is apparently based upon commonality of Greek wording as underscored in Q Parallels: Synopsis, Critical Notes & Concordance, [by] John S. Kloppenborg (c1988): p. 180 (his Q S61). Unfortunately this reconstruction of Q depends upon fragmenting the segments that begin with phrase a and disregarding significant portions, portions that may profoundly affect meaning. If such violations of meaning are shown to be unnecessary, then they become hard to justify. This reconstruction also assumes that Q was in Greek rather than being, say, multilingual.
9. The material unique among the Synoptic Gospels to Matthew, namely combination bc, cannot stand alone. It requires phrase a. This means that source M includes segment abc, which in turn means that, in this instance, M could have been identical to source C.
10. The dependence of phrase e upon phrase a, in combination with the dependence of phrase c upon phrase a, suggests that phrase a was a pivot that could lead into different variations, a hub with different spokes. This is consonant with Matthew's portrayal of Jesus' use of phrase a (5:32; 19:9); and, given the variety of reported phraseology, it is further suggestive of an original corpus of phrases that could be cleverly combined and recombined. Thus it is not totally unreasonable to postulate that Jesus himself may have originated gabc, aed, aefg, abcd, and abe.
11. If the gnomic combination/recombination paradigm is not correct and a paradigm of strata is, even though phrase combination ae is common to all of the Gospels, it does not necessarily represent the earliest stratum. Virtually all of the phrases and phrase combinations of the First Century are equal contenders.
12. The porneia exception, phrase b, rather than being an interpolation reflecting ecclesiastical development, may instead have been part of the earliest phraseology selection. Literary development, if there was any, may have been in the direction of contraction rather than interpolation.
13. Between the First and Second Centuries, a striking theological development is evident (not from the chart, but from the texts in which the logia were embedded). The First Century concern was with the interpretation of Jewish Law, especially with regard to cultic purity. The Second Century concern was with an ascetic-like stringency. The Jewish legal context was fading from view; and, in a new context, the starkness of the phrases lent them to misinterpretation. (Later came the misinterpretation that Jesus was overturning Jewish Law, which even today sometimes colors the reading of the divorce sayings.)
14. No theological development that fits the known pattern of development of the church in the First Century is discernible within the divorce logia, with the possible exception of phrase b, the porneia exception. Regarding phrase b, there are two coincidences:
Two important qualifications are necessary to this observation:
15. The diversity of the logia seems to reflect little more than clever combination and recombination in ways that fit within the broad stream of halachic and prophetic discourse. This point was implicit in the discussion above of Paul's handling of a divorce logion and will be underscored below in the "Topical Analysis."
******
Chronological Analysis #2: Variation and Sameness of Wording
The chronological analysis just given leaves me unsatisfied, this for three reasons:
One avenue for probing at least some of these problems is to take a closer look at segments and phrases that occur more than once in the divorce sayings of the Gospels. They are a, b, d, and e, which are given here in transliteration from the Greek showing the variations.
|
Phrase a, "Everyone who divorces his wife" | |
|---|---|
|
Pas ho apoluon ten gunaika autou |
Matthew 5:32; Luke 16:18; text behind 1 Cor 7:10; C=M |
|
Hos an apoluse ten gunaika autou |
Matthew 19:9; Mark 10:11 |
|
| |
|
Phrase b, "except on the ground of porneia" | |
|
parektos logou porneias |
Matthew 5:32; text behind 1 Cor 7:10; C=M |
|
me epi porneia |
Matthew 19:9 |
|
| |
|
Segment d, "and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery" | |
|
kai hos ean apolelumenen gamese, moichatai |
Matthew 5:32 |
|
lai ho apolelumenen apo andros gamon moicheuei |
Luke 16:18 |
|
| |
|
Phrase e, "and marries another commits adultery" | |
|
kai gamese allen moichatai |
Matthew 19:9; Mark 10:11 (to which is added phrase f) |
|
kai gamon heteran moicheiei |
Luke 16:18 |
Amazingly, a significant variation occurs in each instance, a, b, d, and e; yet at the same time, some of the phrases are repeated using exactly the same wording. An adequate chronology must account for both circumstances.
Typically, in order to account for variations among parallels in the Gospels, the theological motifs of a particular Gospel writer are examined first. One of the most extraordinary observations to be made about a, b, c, and e is that there appears to be no theological cast to any of their variations, with one possible exception, which may have to do with the intended sense of adultery. Compare and contrast phrase e in Mark and Luke:
Both of these points will be revisited below in the "Topical Analysis."
The absence of a theological cast in other variations means that another explanation must be sought for those variations. Conceivably reasons of style may account for some of them, but it can hardly account for all. The most natural explanation is that the variations reflect different translations, in the case of phrase b, two different translations within the same Gospel (just as I am sometimes rendering more than one English translation of a phrase within this very document). Presumably these translations would be from Aramaic.
In First Century Galilee and Judaea, Latin was the language of power, Greek the language of cross-cultural communication, Hebrew the language of Jewish sacred texts, and Aramaic the language of common expression. (Note Pilate's use of Aramaic, Latin, and Greek in John 19:20 and some manuscripts of Luke 23:38.)
Jesus may well have spoken all of these languages, especially given the cultural diversity of Galilee, where he was raised; but explicit representations of his speaking Aramaic suggest that Aramaic was his language of choice. (See Matthew 27:46; Mark 3:17?; 5:41; 7:34; 14:36; 15:34; John 1:42; 20:16?; Acts 26:14.) His Aramaic was probably sprinkled with Hebrew words. For example, when Jesus is reported as saying that "God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham," he appears to be using Hebrew word play: banim for children and abanim for stones (Matthew 3:9 = Luke 3:8; compare rabbi in Matthew 23:7-8 and corban in Mark 7:11).
Furthermore, the followers of Jesus are represented as speakers of Aramaic, probably sprinkled with Hebrew. (For Aramaic, see, for example, Matthew 1:23?; Mark 11:9-10; 15:22; John 20:16; Acts 1:19; 4:36; 9:36; 21:40; 22:2; Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:6. For Hebrew, see, for example, rabbi in John 1:38; 49; 3:2, 26; 6:25.) Of course, they are also represented as speaking a multiplicity of languages (Acts 2:4-11).
Given that Aramaic was native to both Jesus and his early followers, the most natural assumption is that either the direct or the indirect source(s) behind the variations we see in the divorce sayings was in Aramaic. For the purposes of this inquiry, let us call that source or assortment of sources source A, for Aramaic, understanding, however, that the source may have been in another language or in more than one language.
Given that translation appears, due to verbal variation, to be involved with each of the segments and phrases under discussion, verbal commonality in Greek suggests one of these possibilities:
Naturally further complexities are possible, even likely; but at this point the law of parsimony should be applied, which, for the moment, at least, would seem to leave us with this core of possibilities.
For the purposes of this inquiry, let us call the common Greek source or assortment of sources source H, for Hellenic. Furthermore, as a nod to the Two and Four Source theories, let us incorporate Q into this part of the analysis. However, let us distinguish commonality of Greek text between Matthew and Luke, that is, verbal commonality, from mere commonality of meaning (which may yet contain verbal overlap) this way: QV and QM.
Here, now, is an analysis of the relative chronology of segments and phrases a, b, d, e, giving the most likely relationships to A, H, and Q.
Phrase a
|
A | |||
|---|---|---|---|
|
QV |
H | ||
|
Matthew 5:32 (abc) |
Luke 16:18 (ae) |
Matthew 19:9 (abe) |
Mark 10:11 (aef) |
Phrase b
|
A = M? | |
|---|---|
|
Matthew 5:32 (abc) |
Matthew 19:9 (abe) |
Phrase d
|
A | |
|---|---|
|
QM | |
|
Matthew 5:32 (d) |
Luke 16:18 (d) |
Phrase e (option 1, assuming phrase f is a translation variant of phrase e)
|
A | ||
|---|---|---|
|
Matthew 19:9 (abe) |
Mark 10:11 (aef) |
Luke 16:18 (ae) |
Phrase e (option 2, assuming phrase f is an interpolation by Mark)
|
A | ||
|---|---|---|
|
H |
A | |
|
Matthew 19:9 (abe) |
Mark 10:11 (aef) |
Luke 16:18 (ae) |
1. The most striking thing about these charts is that Q is superfluous. Source QM easily collapses into A, the Aramaic source. Even QV easily collapses into H, the common Greek source, assuming, as Matthew might suggest, that at least two forms of the Jesus logia on divorce appear in H.
2. Realizing that this is atomization in the extreme which takes little account of the broader picture regarding Q, the question still arises: Is it possible that Q was nothing more than a list? Or that the divorce sayings did not appear in Q at all?
3. How is it that phrase a appears both in segments that would appear to derive directly from A and yet also in QV and H (or perhaps just H) in two different forms, each of which is exactly duplicated? Could it be that two forms of phrase a existed in a formulaic way in Greek before any of the other phrases and segments were fixed?
4. Strata of meaning are not indicated in these charts, with the possible exception of phrase e in association with phrases b and f.
5. One possible stratum of meaning associated with phrase e would be the addition or deletion of phrase b (the porneia exception). Observing that phrase b is apparently a translation from the Aramaic source(s), it would seem that the movement is in the direction of concision. In other words, Matthew did not add the porneia exception; instead Luke omitted it. Alternatively, Matthew might have added phrase b to ae on the basis of the Aramaic form of phrase b associated with segment abc. In other words, the porneia exception is as old as the other phrases and segments as embedded in abc; but its association with ae might have come later.
6. Another possible stratum of meaning associated with phrase e would be the interpolation of phrase f ("against her") by Mark, as already noted in the previous chronological analysis.
7. Segments and phrases a, b, d, and e all existed prior to the Gospels being written in Greek and prior to the H source.
******
Is it possible to achieve a chronological synthesis between the two sets of analysis just completed? Here is an attempt.
|
Year of the Common Era (C.E. or A.D.) |
Phrase |
Source |
|---|---|---|
|
27-30 |
<abcd, abe, aed, aefg,gabc>?? |
Jesus |
|
27-57 |
abc, d, abe, (aef?), ae, (g?) |
A source |
|
27-57 |
g |
G source = A? |
|
27-57 |
abc |
C source = M? = A?? |
|
27-57 |
gabc |
Reconstructed text behind 1 Cor 7:10 (presumably in Greek if 7:2 was a take off on the wording of phrase b) |
|
27-80 |
abe, aef |
H source |
|
27-80 |
aMt5:32 = aLk16:18; thus a[bc], a[e]?? |
QV 16:18 = H? (Q superfluous) |
|
50-80 |
d, aMt19:9 = aLk16:18; thus d, a[be]?? |
QM 16:18 (superfluous) |
|
54-57 |
hij, plus the Pauline privilege |
1 Corinthians 7:10-11, 15 |
|
64-70 |
aefg |
Mark 10:11-12 |
|
65-80 |
abcd, abe |
Matthew 5:32; 19:9 |
|
65-80 |
aed |
Luke 16:18 |
|
140-155 |
ae |
Hermas, Mandates 4.1.6 |
|
155 |
d, aegsum |
Justin Martyr, Apology 1:15 |
|
200-215 |
jo |
Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis |
1. The most startling finding of this synthesis is that, for all intents and purposes, the A source is identical to what Paul and the Gospels record Jesus as saying, including all or nearly all the variety represented in the divorce sayings.
2. With regard to the divorce sayings of Jesus, the postulation of the Q and M sources is superfluous. They only complicate the picture.
3. Except for phrase f and the association of phrase b with segment ae, the paradigm of strata seems finally to have collapsed. Admittedly, many suppositions are involved, which means that this analysis does not constitute absolute proof. However, the high likelihood is that variations in the divorce logia do not represent strata. They instead represent deliberate combinations and recombinations. The burden of proof shifts to opposing positions.
The question before us in this "topical" section of the analysis is whether anything can be learned from an ordering of the segments of the divorce sayings of Jesus by topic. This is not an exploration of how a segment with one meaning might modify a segment with another meaning. Such an exploration would be for another book. It is rather a question of two other matters:
We will begin this exploration with a lightly paraphrastic rendering of each segment, the segments being organized by topic.
******
|
If a man divorces his wife, except for porneia, he causes her to commit adultery. |
Cf. Matthew 5:32 |
abc |
|
A husband must not divorce his wife. |
1 Corinthians 7:11; cf. 7:27; Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis 3:15 |
j |
|
If a man who is a believer has an unbelieving wife and she consents to live with him, let him not divorce her. |
Cf. 1 Corinthians 7:12 |
Pauline |
|
If an unbelieving spouse (in this case the husband) separates, let it be so; the believing woman is not bound. |
Cf. 1 Corinthians 7:15 |
Pauline |
|
| ||
|
If a man marries a divorced woman, he commits adultery. |
Cf. Matthew 5:32; Luke 16:18; Justin Martyr, Apology 1:15 |
d |
|
| ||
|
The Man Initiates Divorce and Marries "Another" (Double Condition) | ||
|
If a man divorces his wife, except for porneia, and marries another, he commits adultery. |
Cf. Matthew 19:9 |
abe |
|
If a man divorces his wife and marries another, he commits adultery against her. |
Cf. Mark 10:11 |
aef |
|
If a man divorces his wife and marries another, he commits adultery. |
Cf. Luke 16:18; Hermas, Mandates 4.1.6 |
ae |
|
| ||
|
A wife must not separate from her husband. |
1 Corinthians 7:10 |
h |
|
If a wife separates from her husband, let her remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. |
Cf. 1 Corinthians 7:11 |
i |
|
Have you been divorced by your wife? Do not seek a wife. Yet even if you marry, you will not have sinned. |
Cf. 1 Corinthians 7:27-28 |
kl |
|
If a woman who is a believer has an unbelieving husband and he consents to live with her, let her not divorce him. |
Cf. 1 Corinthians 7:13 |
Pauline |
|
If an unbelieving spouse (in this case the wife) separates, let it be so; the believing man is not bound. |
Cf. 1 Corinthians 7:15 |
Pauline |
|
| ||
|
The Woman Initiates Divorce and Marries "Another" (Double Condition) | ||
|
If she divorces her husband, should she marry another, she commits adultery. |
Mark 10:12 |
g |
This topical organization brings out two key issues. First, is "another" for a woman analogous to "another" for a man? Second, are segments abe, aef, and ae comparable to any of the following:
These questions are closely interrelated and must be answered not by isolating strands from one another, but by examining each strand carefully in the context of a woven fabric.
******
We are late in taking note of the apparent parallelism with regard to the word "another," for topical analysis is not necessary to bring it out. It is clearly presented in Mark 10:11-12.
|
Mark 10:11-12, with the Supposed "Another" Parallel | |
|---|---|
|
a |
Whoever divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries another (allen) commits adultery |
|
f |
against her; |
|
g |
and if she divorces her husband, should she marry another (allon), she commits adultery. |
It is far from clear that allen and allon were intended to be parallels in a meaningful way. Given a combination/recombination paradigm, it appears that segment ae was separable from segment g and could be recombined with another segment (segment d in Luke 16:18). Furthermore, segment g as well was apparently re-combinable as a separate unit (with segment abc, in the reconstructed logion behind 1 Corinthians 7:10). The parallelism may be nothing more than an accident of combination.
I am mildly inclined to think otherwise, for two reasons.
Given a meaningful parallel between allen and allon, what would this mean? In modern eyes, the parallel suggests a particular analogy. We tend to presume that "another" means "any other man" for the woman (segment g) and that if "another" means "any other man" for the woman, then surely it must mean "any other woman" for the man (segment aef).
Certainly the dyadic formula of male and female, man and woman, husband and wife, father and mother, son and daughter, brother and sister, young man and maiden, among other such combinations was ubiquitous in ancient Jewish culture as a way of collectively representing two different parts of humankind within a given category. I am thinking of categories such as what we would call a married couple, parents, children, siblings, and youth. However, the analogy of man to woman was hardly ubiquitous. In fact, in sexual and marital matters, analogy was close to unthinkable. (The most prominent exception that comes to mind is Romans 1:26-27; but, as I have argued elsewhere, that supposed exception is based upon a misinterpretation.) This means that, in the text before us, "another" for a male is not likely to be analogous to "another" for a female in the way that we would think; or if it is, the analogy requires a much greater burden of proof than has generally been recognized.
Typically this kind of parallelism in ancient Jewish literature suggests the same or an overlapping meaning, not a clash of meanings. Is this an exception? I think not. The parallel between allen and allon might well have had to do with what was inappropriate for a man or a woman respectively.
******
The double condition is represented in its simplest form by segment ae in Luke 16:18.
|
Luke 16:18 | |
|---|---|
|
a |
Everyone who divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries another commits adultery; |
The most obvious structure, which we will call Structure A, is this:
|
Structure A | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1 (phrase a) |
A man divorces his wife. |
|
Condition 2 (phrase e) |
The man marries another. |
|
Moral effect (end of phrase e) |
If and only if the two conditions are in place, the man has commited a form of adultery. |
Structure A can be expressed in a number of ways, for instance:
However, that is not the only possible structure. Consider, for instance, this structure, which we will call Structure B:
|
Structure B | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1, with moral effect (phrase a + end of e) |
If a man divorces his wife, he commits a form of adultery. |
|
Condition 2, with moral effect (phrase a + e) |
If a man marries "another," he commits a form of adultery. |
|
Total moral effect (end of phrase e) |
If a man has done both, then he has certainly committed adultery! |
Structure B can be expressed in a number of ways, for instance:
The essential difference between Structure A and Structure B can be expressed this way: Structure A has two protases (if-clauses), whereas Structure B has two conditional statements.
Now consider also this structure, which we will call Structure C:
|
Structure C | |
|---|---|
|
Circumstance (phrase a) |
Here we have a particular situation of a man who has divorced his wife; |
|
Condition (phrase e) |
regardless if he marries "another," |
|
Moral effect (end of phrase e) |
he commits adultery. |
In Structure C, phrase a is null. It makes no contribution to the effect of adultery. It assumes that Jesus was speaking to a particular situation.
Finally, consider this structure, which we will call Structure D:
|
Structure D | |
|---|---|
|
Condition (phrase a) |
If a man divorces his wife |
|
Circumstance (phrase e) |
(in this particular situation with him marrying "another"), |
|
Moral effect (end of phrase e) |
he commits adultery. |
In Structure D, the first part of phrase e is null. It makes no contribution to the effect of adultery. It assumes that Jesus was speaking to a particular situation.
Admittedly, the last two structures, C and D, are weak possibilities. Segment ae appears to be abstract in nature, and there is no clue in any of the pericopes in which phrases a and e can be found to suggest that Jesus was speaking to a particular situation, although certainly historical situations could be identified. (See, for example, divorce following betrothal in Josephus, Antiquities 17:18 = 17.1.2; 20:141-143.) Furthermore, given the syntax and the gnomic quality of the utterance, it seems peculiar that part of the saying should have a nugatory quality. It seems to me that these structures should be resorted to only if the first two prove to be completely unworkable and none better can be found.
By the way, the structure that applies to segment ae might apply also to segment g, which reads (in one of its variants), "if a woman divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery." Even though the syntax differs, the internal logical structure may be the same. However, we must be careful of the kinds of analogies we might draw between segments ae and g, both because of syntax differences and because certain kinds of analogies between males and females may be out of place given the cultural frame of reference.
******
Relevant Double Conditions in the Hebrew Bible
In the Hebrew Bible, adultery was a simple matter. It entailed not a series of different kinds of acts, but a single act. How is it, then, that Jesus compiles conditions?
If there is to be an elegant answer to the reason for the double condition, one would expect to find it in the Hebrew Bible. Conceivably the double condition would correspond to the nature of marriage, taking off of Genesis 1:27-28 and 2:24; but it is difficult to find a satisfactory correlation. Or it might be implied in the contrast between the passages Jesus cites in Genesis and Deuteronomy; but, again, a satisfactory correlation is elusive. Or it might have some sort of literary correspondence to double conditions in the Hebrew Bible related to divorce.
Now two sets of double conditions related to divorce do appear in the Hebrew Bible, either of which may prove suggestive. They are found in Deuteronomy 24:1-4 and Malachi 2:11-16.
******
The Double Condition of Deuteronomy 24:1-4
Deuteronomy 24:1-4 follows this pattern:
|
Schematic of Deuteronomy 24:1-4 | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1 |
A man divorces his wife because he has found some indecency in her. |
|
Condition 2 |
She marries another man who either divorces her or dies. |
|
Moral effect |
She is ineligible for her first husband; she has been defiled, and for him to take her back would be an abomination and a sin. |
If Deuteronomy 24 is suggestive as to the meaning of segment ae, we might expect an interpretation like this:
|
Segment ae as Interpreted by Deuteronomy 24:1-4 | |
|---|---|
|
a |
If a man divorces his wife |
|
e |
and remarries her as another man's divorced wife, |
|
end of e |
he commits a form of adultery. |
In other words, Jesus would have simply been restating the Law on divorce in gnomic fashion.
However, this seems to strain the meaning of "another" well past the breaking point. It is possible that Deuteronomy 24 suggested the structure of segment ae, but it is doubtful that it provides the solution to the meaning.
By the way, observe that Deuteronomy 24:1-4 results in an interpretation of segment ae that fits Structure A.
******
The Double Condition of Malachi 2:11-16
The second set of double conditions related to divorce in the Hebrew Bible is found in Malachi 2:11-16, which follows this pattern:
|
Schematic of Malachi 2:11-16 | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1 |
Marriage to the daughter of a foreign god means treachery, abomination, profanation, and being cut off. |
|
Condition 2 |
Divorce from one's wife by covenant means treachery against her. |
|
Moral effect |
Certain recipients of the prophetic message have done both and so have certainly acted treacherously! |
If Malachi 2 is suggestive as to the meaning of segment ae, we might expect an interpretation like this, following Structure A:
|
Segment ae as Interpreted by Malachi 2:11-16 (Structure A) | |
|---|---|
|
a |
If a man both divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries a daughter of a foreign god, |
|
end of e |
he commits a form of adultery. |
Or we might expect an interpretation like this, following Structure B:
|
Segment ae as Interpreted by Malachi 2:11-16 (Structure B) | |
|---|---|
|
a |
If a man divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries a daughter of a foreign god, |
|
end of e |
he commits adultery on both counts. |
In either interpretation, adultery would be a metaphor for treachery, treachery against both wife and God. Presumably it would not exclude moral responsibility for causing one's wife to commit adultery, understanding the husband who divorced her to be complicit in any adultery she might commit.
******
Adultery in Relation to the Double Condition
Let's read segment ae backwards for a moment. In other words, let's start with the effect, namely, adultery.
What do we know about adultery? Leviticus 20:10, Deuteronomy 22:22, and similar passages indicate that adultery for a woman was to take a man other than her one husband. This would suggest that segment g might entail a violation of the rights of the first husband. Furthermore, those passages indicate that adultery for a man was to take his fellow's wife. This would suggest that segment ae might entail another man's wife.
However, we also know that adultery was used as a metaphor for faithlessness against God. (See, for example, Jeremiah 3:8-9 and Ezekiel 23:37.) Such faithlessness could take multiple forms.
So if a double condition does not fit the sense of adultery in its literal sense, it may yet meet it in its metaphorical sense. This point dovetails nicely with the double condition of Malachi 2, except that Malachi 2 does not use the word "adultery."
One further possibility must be entertained, which is that Jesus was redefining adultery, probably not by substitution of a double condition for the simple definition of adultery, but by amplification. Indeed this has been a prevalent interpretation of the divorce sayings. It is reinforced by the dogma that since Jesus was the God-man, he had complete authority to remake Mosaic Law, especially by loosening it where legalism conflicted with goodness and by stiffening it where it seemed permissive. The problems with the idea of Jesus remaking Mosaic Law, at least as traditionally presented, are multifarious; yet the possibility remains that Jesus might have taken exception to some points in the Law. However, if an interpretation can be found that shows Jesus as an interpreter of the Law on divorce, perhaps from a prophetic perspective, this would seem to fit better with his high regard for the Law (see, for example, Matthew 5:17-19 and Luke 16:17) and it would provide a simpler, more satisfactory explanation relative to the context.
******
Segment ae as a Form of Another Segment: Possibilities considered
The discussion above does not provide an immediately obvious solution to the problem of the double condition from the Hebrew Bible. So the question arises, might a better explanation lie within the various segments themselves. Might the double condition of segment ae be explained by reference to segment abc, d, g, or some combination thereof? Might segment ae even be a form of another segment? Let's consider each possibility in turn.
|
Segment ae Compared with Segment abc | |
|---|---|
|
ae |
If a man divorces his wife and marries another, he commits adultery. |
|
abc |
If a man divorces his wife, except for porneia, he causes her to commit adultery. |
There are two suggestions that segment ae might be a rendering of segment abc or vice versa.
Unfortunately, segment abc does not in any way explain the double condition of segment ae. To the contrary, phrase c discusses not the adultery of the man, except, perhaps, by way of moral implication, but the adultery of the woman. Furthermore, Matthew gives both abc and abe, which suggests that in the mind of the author these were complementary sayings, not equivalent sayings.
|
Segment ae Compared with Segment d | |
|---|---|
|
ae |
If a man divorces his wife and marries another, he commits adultery. |
|
d |
If a man marries a divorced woman, he commits adultery. |
There are two suggestions that segment ae might be a rendering of segment d or vice versa.
Unfortunately, segment d explains the double condition of segment ae no better than did segment abc, that is, unless we resort to Structure C and its historical solution. In fact, if anything, it makes the contrast between the single condition for adultery and the double condition more striking. Furthermore, Luke 16:18 places segments ae and d together in a way that appears to treat them as complementary and not equivalent, which seems to eliminate Structure C and its historical solution.
Third, ae = g. For the purposes of the following discussion, it will be useful to give a literal rendering of the segments, inclusive of the key textual variants of segment g. Since the segments appear together in Mark 10:11-12, that is the passage I will use for the following chart.
|
Segment ae Compared with Segment g Reflecting Key Textual Variants of Segment g | |
|---|---|
|
ae(f) |
Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery (against her). |
|
g (Codices Sinaiticus and Vaticanus and other witnesses) |
If she divorces her husband, should she marry another, she commits adultery. |
|
g (Codex Alexandrinus and other witnesses) |
If a woman divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery. |
|
g (Codex Bezae and other witnesses) |
If a woman goes away from the husband and marries another, she commits adultery. |
Here we are talking not about equivalency of meaning between the segments, for in Mark 10:11-12 the meanings are clearly meant to be complementary. However, it is possible, especially given the readings of Alexandrinus and Bezae, that some sort of equivalency in the double conditions is at work.
At least three kinds of equivalency are possible:
We should also consider the possibility that a contrast is intended, especially given the reading from Codices Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, which is commonly thought to be the best reading. To give a possible example:
|
Segment ae Follows Structure B Whereas Segment g Follows Structure A | |
|---|---|
|
ae |
Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery on both counts. |
|
g |
Here we have an instance of a woman who leaves her husband; given that, if she marries another, she commits adultery. |
This interpretation would show Jesus laying a greater onus upon the man, who benefited from the double standards of the day.
Before leaving this comparison of segments ae and g, two further points might be made about their possible relationship.
Fourth, a combination: a + end of e = abc and e = d.
It is tempting to translate the word kai as "also" rather than as "and," which would give, "everyone who divorces his wife, also who marries another, commits adultery"; then to suggest that segment ae is simply a re-rendering of logion abcd (Matthew 5:32). In other words:
|
a + end of e = abc |
Everyone who divorces his wife commits adultery (since he causes her to commit adultery and therefore shares in her moral responsibility) |
|
e = d |
Also everyone who marries another man's divorced wife commits adultery. |
Unfortunately, such a simple solution to the meaning of the double condition seems unlikely, for several reasons:
******
Segment ae as Different from the Other Segments
It seems that we do not have sufficient grounds to claim that segment ae is equivalent in meaning to or a reworking of any other segment, except, perhaps, in an oblique way, segment g. This suggests that segment ae had an independent existence; that is, it conveyed a sense intended to be different from the other segments.
One of the implications is that the sense of the word "another" in segment ae is orphaned. It has no necessary parallel in any other segment. Thus the idea that segment ae can be interpreted in the light of segment d, such that "another" would mean "another divorced woman," is lost to us.
However, is the word "another" really orphaned, or have we simply failed to identify its parent? Two possibilities outside of the segments considered come to mind:
******
Now it is time to consider in a more deliberate but still tentative way the meaning of "another" in segment ae. A definitive attempt must await close examination of the meaning of each logion. (In the first drafts, this Synoptic analysis was shorter by a fifth than the complementary document, which focuses on meaning.) The question here is merely this: What might the analysis to this point suggest as to the meaning of "another."
Four viable interpretations of "another" have emerged:
Let us take each in turn and assess them in terms of their strengths and weaknesses:
First possibility, "another" means "another wife," that is, "any woman other than the divorced wife."
Second possibility, "another" means "another man's wife."
Third possibility, "another" means "another divorced woman."
Fourth possibility, "another" means "a daughter of a foreign god."
******
Now to assess the four interpretations I have called viable.
It seems to me that the first interpretation ("another" means "another wife," that is "any woman other than the divorced wife") is far and away the weakest. Two out of three of its supposed strengths rest upon eisegesis, that is, reading meanings back into the text, in this case out of a different set of cultural assumptions, whether from the Second Century or the Twentieth Century. Furthermore two of the weaknesses are overpowering, namely the lack of justification from the Hebrew Bible and the inability to explain the double condition. I would consider this interpretation still viable, if only barely so, simply because the other interpretations are not fully satisfactory.
The second interpretation ("another" means "another man's wife") is a definite possibility. It is simple and straightforward; however, it lacks elegance.
The third interpretation ("another" means "another divorced woman") has no convincing strengths and several powerful weaknesses, the most telling weakness being that it appears to render Luke 16:18 nonsensical. Frankly, I had thought that this was the interpretation that was going to work; but I now regard it as inferior to both the second and fourth interpretations.
The fourth interpretation ("another" means "a daughter of a foreign god") has one great strength, which is that it provides a powerful framework within which to solve the problem of the double condition, quite possibly with elegance. Furthermore, several of its weaknesses are mitigated to such an extent that they might almost be placed under strengths; and this interpretation engages head on the book of Malachi, which the second and third interpretations both involve anyway, only in lesser ways. Even if some wrinkles are still not ironed out, here we have an intriguing avenue of exploration that may yet yield solutions.
So I conclude that the fourth interpretation has the best chance of being the correct one, although the second is very much in the running.
******
By now it should be obvious that there is no solution to the double condition and the meaning of "another" in segment ae that is both simple and elegant. The simple solutions turn out to be not so simple after all or else problematic, including those that would make segment ae equivalent to segment abc or d; and the only solutions that might approach elegance are complex, involving the metaphorical sense of adultery.
Let's pursue a bit further the idea, which is the leading contender for an adequate solution, that the double condition of segment ae alludes to Malachi 2 11-16 and that "another" in segment ae refers to "a daughter of a foreign God," that is, to a woman outside the covenant of faith. As we do so, it is important to remember that, short of full-scale exegesis, which is not being conducted here, any conclusion will be only preliminary.
First, let's consider this interpretation in terms of Structure A:
|
Segment ae Following Structure A | |
|---|---|
|
a |
If a man both divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries a daughter of a foreign god, |
|
end of e |
he commits a form of adultery (adultery in a metaphorical sense). |
If each condition is adequate unto itself to constitute faithlessness towards God in Malachi, why does it take both conditions together to constitute adultery in segment ae? One possibility is that segment ae is infusing the logical structure of Deuteronomy 24:1-4 with the conditions of Malachi 2:11-16, in order to make a prophetic point parallel to the legal point of Deuteronomy 24, thus:
|
Structure A | |
|---|---|
|
Deuteronomy 24:1-4 schematized |
Segment ae |
|
If a man divorces his wife for indecency |
If a man both divorces his wife |
|
and she is divorced again from "another man," |
and marries a daughter of a foreign god, |
|
she is ineligible for her first husband, being defiled. |
he commits a form of adultery (adultery in a metaphorical sense). |
This interpretation suggests that Jesus might have interpreted the "another man" of Deuteronomy 24 to be, in the first instance, a man outside the covenant of faith, hence the defilement of the woman. This, by the way, may give import to segment d, in which Jesus says that a man who marries a divorced woman commits adultery. In other words, Jesus would be saying in segment d that, even if the woman marries a man within the covenant of faith, another sort of defilement has taken place, for the first marital covenant has not been respected.
Does this interpretation of Deuteronomy 24, as suggested on the part of Jesus, hang together? Consider this chain of thought: Why is the twice divorced woman ineligible for her first husband and not for another man within the covenant of faith? She would be ineligible, given segment d. But then why would a woman divorced once be ineligible for a man within the covenant of faith? Because he is disrespecting that covenant, which is the point of segment ae. We have a backhand reasoning, which actually makes a kind of sense.
In terms of the other logic of segment ae, this interpretation would suggest that only the two treacheries together constitute the level of offense for which adultery would be the metaphor; although, according to segment abc, even divorce alone makes a man responsible for his wife committing adultery.
The key prophetic point is this: Just as a woman can be defiled by divorce involving a double condition, so can a man. In the latter case, the defilement is by faithlessness to covenantal relationships, that is, first to the relationship with one's wife and, second, to the relationship with God.
Still, none of these problems absolutely disqualifies the application of Structure A to this interpretation.
Second, let's consider this interpretation in terms of Structure B:
|
Segment ae Following Structure B | |
|---|---|
|
a |
If a man divorces his wife |
|
e |
and marries a daughter of a foreign god, |
|
end of e |
he commits adultery on both counts (that is, adultery in a metaphorical sense). |
Remembering that segments ae and g might be parallel in structure, we must consider the impact of applying Structure B to segment ae upon segment g. Here are the options, understanding that segment ae follows structure B and is to be read metaphorically:
Let's consider each option in turn. First:
|
Segment g Following Structure A and with a Literal Sense | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1 |
If a woman divorces her man, |
|
Condition 2 |
should she then marry "another," |
|
Moral effect |
she commits adultery in the literal sense. |
This interpretation appears to imply that if a woman divorces her husband, she is not allowed to remarry; for she is yet tied to her husband, not having the authority herself to dissolve the marriage in such a way as to allow for remarriage. In other words, for a woman to take, at her own initiative, a man other than her first husband, if he is still living, constitutes adultery in the simple literal sense of Leviticus 20:10 and Deuteronomy 22:22.
Second:
|
Segment g Following Structure A and with a Metaphorical Sense | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1 |
If a woman divorces her man, |
|
Condition 2 |
should she then marry "another," |
|
Moral effect |
she commits adultery in the metaphorical sense. |
Third:
|
Segment g Following Structure B and with a Literal Sense | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1 |
If a woman divorces her man, she commits adultery in a literal sense. |
|
Condition 2 |
If a woman marries a man not of the faith, she commits adultery in a literal sense. |
|
Moral effect |
She has certainly committed adultery! |
Fourth:
|
Segment g Following Structure B and with a Metaphorical Sense | |
|---|---|
|
Condition 1 |
If a woman divorces her man, she commits adultery in a metaphorical sense. |
|
Condition 2 |
If a woman marries a man not of the faith, she commits adultery in a metaphorical sense. |
|
Moral effect |
She has certainly committed adultery, that is, faithlessness against God! |
It would appear that the last option -- understanding both segments ae and g as metaphorical and fitting Structure B -- is the most workable of all that have been considered. The next question is whether it works with phrase b and segments abc and d.
Phrase b, the porneia exception, is an integral part of segment ae in Matthew 19:9, where the structure is abe. Let's take another look at segment ae in the light of Structure B and metaphorically understood, this time with phrase b:
|
Segment abe Following Structure B and with a Metaphorical Sense | |
|---|---|
|
a |
If a man divorces his wife, |
|
b |
except for porneia, |
|
e |
and marries a daughter of a foreign god, |
|
end of e |
he commits adultery on both counts (that is, adultery in a metaphorical sense). |
In other words, if a man divorces his wife for porneia, he is not acting faithlessly. On the contrary, he may well be trying to set his marriage right with God if it is incestuous; or he may be responding to the faithlessness of his wife towards both God and himself; or he may be freeing his faithful wife from his extirpation if he himself has taken another man's wife, or engaged in either bestiality or homosexual acts. Phrase b fits beautifully with the metaphorical/ Structure B interpretation of segment ae.
Now let us examine segment d, which says that "whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery." We will examine it ahead of abc, since d may affect the logic of abc.
The tentative finding that segments ae and g are speaking of adultery in the metaphorical sense suggests that the same may be true of segment d. Indeed, Deuteronomy 24:1-4 implies that a divorced woman was eligible for marriage to a man besides the man who divorced her, which means that legally and therefore literally marrying a divorced woman was not adultery.
However, to marry a divorced woman was to interfere in the prospects for reconciliation between a husband and his divorced wife, which was to interfere in covenantal matters of faith; and if the conditions of Deuteronomy 24:1-14 were met, it was to remove those prospects forever (cf. Jeremiah 3:1). The prophet Hosea desired that the people of Israel return to their first husband, Yahweh, and become betrothed to him forever (Hosea 2:7, 19). To act contrary to this was to undergird faithlessness. Segment d may be saying that if a man would leave open his prospects for reconciliation with God, then he should leave open a woman's prospects of reconciliation with her husband. To do otherwise was tantamount to adultery in the metaphorical prophetic sense.
I am hardly certain that this was the logic behind the metaphor. The First Century Jewish philosopher of Alexandria, Philo, used a different process of reasoning to conclude that a man who married a divorced woman took upon himself the stamp of both adultery and pandering (De Specialibus Legibus 3:31). However, for the purposes of this synoptic analysis, it is sufficient to demonstrate merely the possibility that adultery in segment d was to be understood metaphorically; and I suspect that we are in the right ballpark.
Segment abc says that if a man divorces his wife, except for porneia, he causes her to commit adultery. Thus far, we have not had to wrestle with the meaning of phrase c, "causes her to commit adultery." Adultery can be taken in either a literal or a metaphorical sense; but either way, the interpretation is problematic. How can a man cause his wife either to commit adultery in the literal sense or to act faithlessly against God?
Let's consider first the literal sense of adultery in segment abc. We have two problems:
Now let's consider the metaphorical sense. There is one basic problem: How can any person be responsible for another person's faithlessness against God? In the way that we moderns think of faith, this problem would seem to be insurmountable. But in the Jewish mind of the Second Temple period, the issue was one of being within the covenant of faith in order to receive the inheritance of promise; and that was not an individual matter, but a family matter. A woman's share in the inheritance was by being under a man or, in the case of widows, through the tithes given to the temple and similar measures (Deuteronomy 14:28-29; 24:19-21; 26:12-13; cf. 1 Timothy 5:3-16); and her active participation in the ongoing nature of this inheritance was through childbearing (hence 1 Timothy 2:15).
If a woman was divorced by her husband, she was essentially cut off from the divine promise of inheritance. She might return to her father (Sirach 42:9) or to a kinsman (2 Sam 13:20; cf. Esther 2:7, 20), if either of those options was available to her; or she might remarry. Otherwise, she fell through the cracks; and in any event, she was no longer participating in the processive nature of the original inheritance she expected. Whether her children, if she had any, were retained by her husband or turned out with her (as in Genesis 21:10-14; Ezra 10:3, 44; cf. Genesis 25:6), she herself was in a realm immediately parallel to those cut off from Israel for certain offenses; and she shared something of the same penalty, at least in microcosm. (The root meaning of the key Hebrew word for divorce, kerithuth, is "cut off.") If segment d makes her ineligible for any other man within the covenant of faith, which it seems to do, then her penalty approaches the scale of those who actually were cut off from Israel, even the penalty of the adulteress (following Leviticus 18:20, 29 rather than 21:10). In terms of effect, she was an adulteress, just like a person nowadays who loses a job through no fault of his or her own is just as unemployed as the person who is fired for cause and just as all those who lose their jobs suffer the same stigma and suspicion (notice Sirach 34:22). Given this line of thought, segment abc would be saying that no woman should be divorced unless either she or the husband is deserving of that level of penalty.
Intriguingly, we have a coincidence between Malachi 2:15 in the Septuagint and phrase c in Matthew 5:32 that fits this line of thought and suggests we carry it further. The same word, poieo, is used in both passages in a mysterious way that has a bearing on the issue of divorce. Above I paraphrastically rendered the beginning of Malachi 2:15 this way: "Another (that is, a man outside the covenant of faith) was not responsible for producing (poieo) at least some children of the covenant by your former wife as you had done." Could it be that Matthew was signaling a connection between segment c and Malachi 2? Possibly. I would not want to rest an argument upon supposing so; but if there is anything to the idea, it might suggest that phrase c means that the woman is placed in a realm where, if she is to follow the first commandment, "to be fruitful and multiply" (Genesis 1:28), she can do so only outside of the covenant of faith and the promised inheritance. She cannot win. She does not have the privileges of a widow; and she cannot obey the first commandment, except outside of the covenant of faith. She is forced not only into the realm of faithlessness, but into active faithlessness. She not only shares the penalty of the adulteress, but she is forced to commit adultery in the metaphorical sense. For all of this, the man who divorces her is responsible; or, at least, he shares in her responsibility. Of course, we would not need a coincidence with Malachi 2:15 for this addendum to the line of thought to work.
The chief weakness of this hypothesis regarding segment abc is that it is all tenuous. Its chief strength is that offers an explanation that is in synchronization with Mosaic Law as filtered through the prophetic tradition. In any event, it seems to me that the metaphorical/ Structure B interpretation of segment ae does not stand or fall with any of the interpretations of segment abc just considered, for they remain problematic however one interprets segment ae. This avenue simply appears to be the least problematic.
It ought to be noted at this point that the metaphorical interpretation of the divorce sayings of Jesus leaves the doctrine of the indissolubility of marriage unsupported by those sayings. One of the options has always been to read the divorce sayings deontologically rather than ontologically, in other words to say that they are speaking of moral obligation, not of the nature of marriage. However, the sayings were hard to explain without postulating the indissolubility of marriage. Here we have an alternative explanation, one that allows for a merely deontological interpretation. If this interpretation is correct, it means that Jesus probably assumed the dissolubility of marriage, but placed a moral onus upon any person within the faith not to initiate divorce and to leave open the path of reconciliation with a former spouse also in the faith.
So to conclude this section, the best interpretation of segment ae suggested by Synoptic analysis, an interpretation that is at least as consistent with segments abc, d, and g as any other, is as follows:
Given this interpretation of segment ae, the best interpretation of segments abc, d, and g is to read adultery as metaphorical in each instance. This means that either Jesus or those who later spoke for him were using halachic discourse as a way of making prophetic points. Here then is a chart of how the segment might be understood:
|
The Four Main Segments Paraphrased to Reflect a Metaphorical Interpretation | |
|---|---|
|
Segment abc |
Each man within the covenant of faith who divorces his wife, except on the ground of porneia, causes her to suffer a penalty comparable to that for adultery and to act in a way that is faithless to either the Law or the promises of God, which is adultery in the metaphorical sense. |
|
Segment d |
Each man within the covenant of faith who marries a divorced woman is complicitous in faithlessness towards God, which is adultery in the metaphorical sense. |
|
Segment ae |
If a man within the covenant of faith divorces his wife and marries a woman outside the covenant of faith, he is guilty of adultery on both counts, that is, adultery in a metaphorical sense. |
|
Segment g |
If a woman within the covenant of faith divorces a man and marries a man not within the covenant of faith, she is guilty of adultery on both counts, that is, adultery in a metaphorical sense. |
Here is a round-up of some of the suppositions and findings found in this analysis.
1. Finding: It is not necessary to seek a solution to any conflict between Jesus and Paul in a possible Pauline distinction between types of divorce (chorizo and aphiemi). See above.
2. Supposition: Jesus did not follow any particular rabbinic school of thought on divorce, but instead carved out his own way in the debate of his day. See above.
3. Finding: The specific logion to which Paul alluded in 1 Corinthians 7:10 took the form of gabc or abcg, although it is possible that Paul drew upon two different logia to make that combination himself. (The combinations gae and aeg are also possibilities.) Of particular note, the porneia exception, phrase b, was known to Paul. See above.
4. Finding: The logion behind 1 Corinthians 7:27-28 is the same as that behind 7:10. See above.
5. Supposition: The definition of porneia used by the early church, at least in some instances, had specific reference to the sexual and marital offenses of Leviticus 18; and the church's application of the porneia prohibition to itself, insofar as it followed Pauline teaching, was according to the intensification for priests in Leviticus 21:7. This was an application that had eschatological overtones. See above.
6. Supposition: 1 Corinthians 5-7 is a rabbinic responsum to the Corinthian church containing a midrash upon Leviticus 18 and 21 as filtered through one or more of the divorce sayings of Jesus, the decision of the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15), and early Christian temple theology. See above.
7. Supposition: In Paul's mind, the effect of conversion made a fundamental difference to the issue of divorce. See above.
8. Finding: It is entirely possible not only that Paul's teaching on divorce is compatible with the divorce sayings of Jesus, but that Paul was well aware of all segments of the divorce sayings now found in the canonical Gospels. See above.
9. Finding: Implicit both in the divorce sayings of Jesus, if "adultery" is to be taken literally (which it is not), and in Paul's discussion of divorce is the polygynous double standard of the Jews of the day regarding adultery. See above.
10. Finding: The divorce sayings did not overturn polygyny in favor of monogamy. Nor did they overturn a sexist double standard with regard to the social structure of marriage. See above.
11. Finding: The divorce sayings of Jesus do imply a moral equality between the sexes, and the discussion of divorce by Paul implies a spiritual equality between male and female. See above.
12. Finding: No theological development that fits the known pattern of development of the church in the First Century is discernible within the divorce logia, with the possible exception of phrase b, the porneia exception. A late omission of phrase b from the abe combination would fit the pattern of theological development. See above.
13. Finding: All of the phrases and most of the variety of combination recorded in the divorce sayings of the canonical Gospels were present in the supposed Aramaic source(s) that predated those Gospels. See above.
14. Finding: With regard to the divorce sayings of Jesus, the postulation of the Q and M sources is superfluous. In fact, with regard to Q, it is easier to suppose that the divorce sayings did not appear in it at all or else that Q never existed. See above.
15. Finding: The high likelihood is that major variations in the divorce logia do not represent strata. They instead represent deliberate combinations and recombinations. The prevailing paradigm of strata has collapsed, at least as the probable paradigm. See above.
16. Supposition: In Mark 10:11-12, "another" for a male is not likely to be analogous to "another" for a female, except in terms of comparable inappropriateness, at least if the frame of understanding was meant to be social. See above.
17. Finding: In segment ae, which reads, "everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery," it is highly unlikely that "another" means "any other woman." Two other interpretations are much more likely, that "another" means "another man's wife" and that it means "a daughter of a foreign god" per Malachi 2:11-16. The last is the most likely meaning. See above.
18. Finding: The double condition of segment ae most likely follows this structure: If a man divorces his wife and marries the daughter of a foreign god, he commits adultery on both counts. See above.
19. Finding: Synoptic analysis suggests that adultery is to be read in a metaphorical prophetic sense in all of the segments. See above.
20. Finding: The divorce sayings are probably not speaking of the nature of marriage but instead of behavior relating to marriage. In philosophical terms, the sayings are not ontological but deontological. See above.
Almost all of the findings were surprises to me. Taken collectively, they reflect no current school of interpretation, whether characterized as liberal or conservative. However, they do make it an easy leap to assume that Jesus himself was responsible for all of the major variations in the central logion of the divorce pericopes of the Gospels, a position which has not been thought tenable, except perhaps among dogmatists, for over a century.
Did the method determine the outcome? The simple answer is, yes, of course it did and hopefully so. But, naturally, the deeper question is whether either the method or its application was defective? For instance, did my own presuppositions affect the outcome?
For what it is worth, I can say that I did not particularly care what the outcome would be; and that outcome turned out to be far from what I expected. Here is a rough description of my pre-understandings:
This analysis was mercilessly methodical; and, in the face of such analysis, one expectation after another fell, some expectations falling at the very end. For instance, I have yet barely assimilated the idea that the "another" of segment g probably does not mean any man other than the first husband.
This methodical quality of the analysis brought out what appears to be a mathematical logic within the sayings. Yet one wonders to what degree mathematical logic within the sayings can be relied upon. For instance, if we allow for a little bit of woolliness, imprecision, divergency in reporting, perhaps it could be said that segments abc and ae are equivalent. Certainly we must beware of forced harmonization (per mathematical logic) and of imputing mathematical logic where the process of reasoning in the sources is quite different. Yet, amazingly, this logic that we have uncovered within the sayings not only works, but has an obvious quality to it once revealed. (To give an example of that obvious quality: Of course if the definition of adultery conflicts with the Law, that's because it's being used in a metaphorical sense!) Given that the logic works so well and that the sorts of distinctions it assumes were common to rabbinic hermeneutics, it is reasonable to suppose intention behind that logic.
I am far from claiming that the findings of this analysis are mathematically necessary. That would be to confuse the method, which allows only for possibilities, likelihoods, and ranges, with a possible logic to the sayings. Besides, this analysis is only preliminary to exegesis; and it would seem to be wise to leave as much leeway as possible for the next steps in interpretation. However, it seems to me that the onus is now upon those who hold conflicting positions to show a stronger case.
If the combination/recombination paradigm with its internal logic holds up, it points to a creative genius at its source; and the attributions are, of course, to Jesus. We are used to thinking of the moral genius of Jesus; but seldom do we consider the hermeneutical, literary, and logical genius of Jesus. I am inclined to think that much more attention needs to be paid to that aspect of other sayings attributed to him. Hitherto the Synoptic problem seemed too much of an obstacle and forced harmonization too much of a danger to proceed with such an investigation, but it may be possible to isolate other sayings that show evidence of following a combination/recombination paradigm or that might otherwise evidence creative genius at work.
Other areas for further research include:
When we realize how much more there is to understand about the divorce sayings and their context, we must face with utter humility how far short this Synoptic analysis alone is from being conclusive. However, if this analysis has done nothing else, it has demonstrated that we must open our minds to non-traditional understandings of the divorce sayings of Jesus.
|
a Everyone who divorces his wife |
Matthew 5:32; 19:9; Mark 10:11; Luke 16:18; Hermas, Mandates 4.1.6 |
|
b except on the ground of porneia | |
|
c causes her to commit adultery | |
|
d whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery |
Matthew 5:32 ; Luke 16:18; Justin Martyr, Apology 1:15; Permutations |
|
e and marries another commits adultery |
Matthew 19:9; Mark 10:11; Luke 16:18; Hermas, Mandates 4.1.6 |
|
f against her | |
|
g if she divorces her husband, should she marry another, she commits adultery | |
|
h A wife must not separate from her husband | |
|
i If she does separate, let her remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband | |
|
j a husband must not divorce his wife | |
|
k Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be released | |
|
l Are you released from a wife? Do not seek a wife | |
|
m yet even if you marry, you will not have sinned | |
|
n if a maiden marries, she does not sin | |
|
o he who has not married should not marry |
|
abc |
Matthew 5:32; Reconstructed text behind 1 Corinthians 7:10-11; Permutations |
|
abe | |
|
ae | |
|
aef | |
|
aegsum |
|
abc/d | |
|
abc/abe | |
|
abe | |
|
ae | |
|
ae/d |
Luke 16:18 = Q 16:18 |
|
aef/g | |
|
d/aegsum | |
|
d/g | |
|
g/abc | |
|
h/i/j | |
|
k/l/m/n | |
|
j/o |
First draft (four pages) written May 22, 1996; sample posted, April 17, 1998; full book posted May 1, 1998; new url, January 28, 2004; last modification, January 28, 2004
Copyright ©1998-2004 by Norman E. Anderson
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